1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a light-emitting diode (LED) light source and, more particularly, to an LED light source wherein a plurality of LED chips are integrally packaged, so that the LED light source can be easily made while having a small volume and providing high brightness.
2. Description of Related Art
Light-emitting diodes are known for their long service life, low power-consumption and being environmentally friendly, and are therefore widely used as a light source in various fields. When LEDs are used for providing light, a single LED seldom satisfies the need of lighting because of its limited brightness. Therefore, a plurality of LEDs must be used at the same time to produce the desired lighting effect. Presently, it is a common practice to combine a plurality of single LED package structures together and secure them to an external device, wherein the LED package structures are driven by electricity.
For convenience of use, the existing technologies also provide a variety of individual LED module structures, and as many such module structures as needed can be secured to an external device and driven by electricity for use. A common LED module has a structure comprising a substrate, such as a printed circuit board, provided with a printed circuit pattern for transmitting electric signals; and a plurality of LED package structures arranged into a certain array and fixedly attached to the substrate to form the LED module, which can be fixedly attached to an external device or installed into a housing to form a light source.
However, in an LED module having the aforementioned conventional structure, every single LED must be individually packaged and then a plurality of package structures thus formed are assembled. Not only is the above process complicated but also the final product has a larger size and a more diffuse brightness. Now that a lot of products of today are designed with higher and higher precision to become more and more compact, the LED light sources used in these products must meet the requirement of having a small volume and a high brightness. And this requirement has indicated the limitation on the applications of LED modules having conventional structures.